


ask for what you need

by Helenish



Series: Here is a thing that isn't happening. [12]
Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: M/M, underage mumble mumble
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-08
Updated: 2011-02-08
Packaged: 2017-10-15 12:47:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/160957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Helenish/pseuds/Helenish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anyone else, Eames would pull them aside.</p>
            </blockquote>





	ask for what you need

Eames is not a cautious person by nature, but it was trained into him early, so he takes care, at first. He watches Arthur, this Arthur, who has more of a ragged edge than he remembers, who is abrupt, demanding, wound up tight. He doesn’t allow himself to think of that first awful year, when he’d been so certain that Arthur would forgive him, when he would come back to his hotel room every day thinking he might find Arthur sitting on the bed, drinking a cup of gas station coffee, waiting for him. That was a long time ago, but perhaps Arthur doesn’t think so, because he picks at Eames constantly, asks him questions, brings him ideas and tells him to look them over, leans back against Eames’ desk and waits, like Eames is still in high school, struggling through a quadratic equation. It aggravates him, but he tolerates it. He’s not interested in provoking Arthur into a power struggle, so he gives him as much space as he can.

Nela’s lead, but she usually lets Eames do whatever he wants to get the job done as long as he doesn’t mess around with her build, and she seems to afford Arthur the same freedom. Too many cooks, Eames thinks, watching Arthur write out the target’s itinerary on a white board. There’s a long smudge of marker on the pale skin of his arm, just under the point of his elbow. The target is very careful, very organized; the client wants the job done undetected, but they haven’t found a way to crack the guy’s schedule yet in way that it won’t be immediately obvious that there’s been tampering. Eames mentions this little conundrum, and Arthur snaps out, "I know, and I am working on it. What do you suggest I do?"

Anyone else, Eames would pull them aside, say, what the fuck is your problem, we’re supposed to be working together, push it a little, but Arthur--doesn’t trust him, maybe. Doesn’t want his help.

"I’m sure you’ll figure it out," he says, and Arthur gives him an impatient, disappointed glare and turns back to the board.

Wonderful, Eames thinks, and books a four day trip to take a look at the youngest son.

*

"You’re leaving," Arthur says, that night, leaning in the door of the kitchen. It’s Eames’ turn to cook.

"I think you have it pretty well nailed down here," he says. He spoons a piece of carrot out of the stewpot; it’s tender in his mouth.

"I just--"

"Do you think I’m incapable of conducting surveillance on my own?" Eames says. He keeps his body carefully loose, but Arthur shifts back anyhow.

"No," he says. "I just thought." Eames ladles him out a bowl of stew, drops a generous dollop of mashed potatoes on top, tucks in a spoon, and puts it down on the counter in front of him. "Fine," Arthur says. He picks up the bowl. "I’ll see you next week."

Eames spends the next days filling in as a janitor at a sunny prep-school outside Turku, mopping floors, emptying trash. The kid is sullen, uncooperative, lonely, and reminds Eames uncomfortably of how much he owes Arthur. Arthur, for his part, seems to be trying for a truce, and offers to pick Eames up at the airport.

"That’s not necessary," Eames says. "My flight doesn’t get in until nearly midnight." The airport is a couple hundred clicks away, a long and inconvenient drive.

"I’ll be out that way anyhow," Arthur says.

*

Arthur picks him up in a nondescript late-model sedan, drives for nearly 30 minutes in the wrong direction over increasingly rutted back roads, and finally pulls over on a narrow, dark, forest-edged road.

"Switch with me," he says, and gets out of the car.

Eames walks around to the driver’s side and gets in. In the mirror, he watches Arthur pull an empty duffel bag and a heavy, black hooded sweatshirt out of the back seat. He pulls on the sweatshirt, then rolls up the duffel bag and tucks it in the front before zipping it up. Then he flips the hood up over his head and taps on the window. Eames rolls it down.

"Keep it running," Arthur says. The sweatshirt is too big for him, hanging loosely off his shoulders. "If I’m not back in 20 minutes, go back to the school."

"But--"

Arthur lifts his hand in a wave and steps into the high grass next to the road and then climbs up and over the high chain link fence, dropping easily to the ground on the other side and disappearing into the darkness.

Eames checks his watch.

Arthur is back in fifteen minutes. He throws the duffel bag--now full--over the fence and then boosts himself up and over, jogs to the car, throws the duffel in the backseat and gets in.

"Go," he says. He’s not even out of breath.

They drive, Arthur giving directions, for nearly an hour back towards the city. Arthur doesn’t offer an explanation, and Eames doesn’t ask. Eventually, Arthur twists back between the seats and unzips the bag. In the rearview mirror, Eames sees that it’s crammed with large white plastic bottles, with silver blisterpacks of pills sealed in clear plastic. Arthur breaks open one of the bags and pulls out a bottle, and then slides back up into the front seat, puts his seatbelt back on, slits the seal on the bottle with his thumbnail and dry-swallows three pills, tilting his head back against the seat, eyes closed.

"Arthur," Eames says. "What--"

"Sorry, did you want some?" Arthur says.

"no, _what_?" Eames says. "I don’t--want any."

"Fine," Arthur says. "Take a left up here."

"What is all this stuff?" Eames says.

"Oxycodone, mostly," Arthur says, "Amphetamines."

"You--this was about stealing drugs?"

"Easier than knocking over a pharmacy," Arthur says. "There’s not much security to bypass at the warehousing level. I had time to alter the shipping manifest--it'll be a while before anyone even notices it's missing."

"Arthur--"

"Turn here," Arthur says.

"Jesus Christ," Eames says. He yanks the car sideways onto the shoulder and kills the engine.

"What?" Arthur says, annoyed, and Eames grabs his wrist and says,

"Arthur. How long have you been using?" Arthur’s looked tired, at the school, nothing that can’t be explained by how hard he’s been working, but it happens, the painkillers required to work through an injury becoming a little too useful, no time to break the habit before the next job, and Arthur has been irritable, but nothing more, hidden it well.

Arthur looks up at him; it’s very dark in the car. Then he smiles faintly and tugs his wrist out of Eames’ grasp. "This is ibuprofen," he says. "I have a headache."

"Oh," Eames says.

"Drive," Arthur says. "We’ll be late."

"What was I supposed to think," Eames mutters, pulling back onto the road. "You didn't exactly let me in on your plans."

"You didn't ask," Arthur says shortly.

"Fine," Eames says. "Could you please tell me what the everloving fuck you think you’re doing?"

"I started a drug war," Arthur says.

"You--" Eames risks a glance at Arthur, who looks very small, almost young, in the seat next to him, the sweatshirt loose and sloppy around his neck. "Why?" he says, in the most reasonable voice he can muster.

"This fucking guy," Arthur says. "Karjalainen. Nice regimented schedule, comfortable lunches with the chief of police every Thursday, Monday morning meeting with the mayor, private police security detail. An uptick in crime puts pressure on law enforcement, on public officials. Schedule changes, maybe a few new faces around the place--no one thinks much of it. Drug crime requires quite a bit of manpower to police, it’s untraceable, unrelated to our job, and self-sustaining once you kick it off."

"And you didn’t think to discuss this with me before you started flooding the streets with opiates?" Eames says.

"When," Arthur says. "When would I have discussed this with you? Every time I tried to talk to you last week you blew me off."

"That’s not--no," Eames says. "I--"

"And then you dumped this whole thing on me and took off for a fucking week," Arthur says.

"Four days," Eames says. "And I had a phone the entire time. Just because you don’t want to work with me doesn’t mean you can make unilateral decisions--"

" _I_ don’t want to work--" Arthur begins, and then sucks in a heavy, furious breath. "You’re the one who walked out on me," he says quietly. "You never even--Jesus, you could have called, Mal was worried fucking sick about you--"

"Is that what this is about?" Eames says.

"This is about the fact that you expect me to do this whole fucking job by myself without any feedback or backup," Arthur says.

"I gave you feedback."

"Telling me to do whatever I think is best is not feedback," Arthur bites out.

"Okay," Eames says. "All right. I didn’t want to step on your toes, I thought you could handle it."

"I--Nela’s great, and Tim’s a nice kid, but I can’t work with half a team," Arthur says. "I need someone who has my back on this job--"

"Then don’t expect me to read your fucking mind," Eames says. "Don’t be angry at me just because you were too chickenshit to just come out and ask for what you needed."

"All right," Arthur says, angrily, shifting in his seat. Eames forces himself to loosen his grasp on the steering wheel. They drive in silence, past the posh suburbs, past the downtown, the business district, until the buildings are old and cramped, street lights smashed. Arthur says, "pull in here," and Eames parks the car in the hulking shadow of an abandoned warehouse.

"Eames. I should have--" Arthur presses his lips together. "texted you or something. Tim and Nela agreed, so technically you would have been outvoted anyway."

"But Tim and Nela are tucked up safely in their beds and I’m here with you, doing--what exactly?"

"Adding product to the market and destabilizing the current power structure."

Eames sighs.

"We’re going to deal some drugs, we’re going to knock some heads, we’re going to get everyone good and pissed off, and then we’re going to let it play out," Arthur elaborates. He opens the glove compartment and pulls out two ski masks.

"Great," Eames says.

"Do you have a moral objection to to beating up drug dealers?" Arthur says, sounding tired.

"It’s just something I generally try to avoid," Eames says, yanking the ski mask over his head. "But needs must."

"Needs must," Arthur mutters under his breath, a little huff of laughter.

"What?”

"It’s--you never used to say stuff like that," Arthur says. "British stuff."

"Oh, when I was attempting to be inconspicuous at an American high school?" Eames says, a little defensively.

"I like it," Arthur says, his voice thoughtful. "Seems useful. Violating someone’s subconscious mind probably seems a lot less despicable if you can hire a glamorous English guy to take care of it for you."

"I’m not--glamorous,” Eames says. “I’m just talking. like a normal person."

"Yeah, okay, Double-oh seven," Arthur says. "Ready?"

"Don’t be a prick," Eames says, but without any heat. Arthur’s face is lit up with a helpless, secret little grin; Eames sees it before he pulls the ski mask down over his mouth.


End file.
